Colorado Rockies salvage split, start another series with the Giants

Lyles notches solid outing but looks to improve further - Rockies.com

Kyle Kendrick and Jordan Lyles' two straight six-plus inning starts gave the bullpen a much-needed breather after a brutal five game losing streak. Yesterday Lyles went 6.2 innings, struck out four and walked two while inducing ten ground outs. He gave up just the one run.

When Lyles has his fastball command under control he can really shorten up games. His sinker dives down and to the hand-side, inducing weak contact from lefties and righties alike. When he's off, though, he puts too much lateral movement on the fastball and it slides off the plate to the third base side, putting him in bad counts and leading to walks. Lyles recognizes this in Harding's article and says he's working hard on limiting that tendency.

I shudder to think where this team would be without Lyles this year. A rotation that's already troubled would instead be in shambles.

Dickerson homers again to lead Rockies to series split - Rockies.com

Corey Dickerson is incredible. He slugged his fifth home run yesterday to break the 1-1 tie.

Heston, Butler meet again in Giants-Rockies series - Rockies.com

It's nice that Eddie Butler has a 2.25 ERA. It's less nice that his FIP of 4.87 more than doubles it and that he has walked more batters than he has struck out. Butler -- like seemingly every Rockies pitcher this year -- needs to start finding the strike zone.

Meanwhile, the Giants just swept the Dodgers (who just swept the Rockies, who just swept the Giants...), so they'll be feeling confident. Hopefully the Rockies take the jam out of their doughnuts with a series victory.

Taking Baseball's Pulse: Checking up on the trends that are transforming the game - Grantland

The Rockies are on pace to employ defensive shifts 590% more this year than last. Another piece of evidence that the Bridich regime isn't a Dan O'Dowd clone.